President Obama participates in a live Twitter question-and-answer session at the White House Dec. 3. The government should create a digital platform that would allow citizens and their representatives to communicate directly.

This month, members of the 113th Congress began scanning their official voting cards, while the rest of us - the other 315,083,858 members of America's representative democracy - were left to tweet from the sidelines. It doesn't have to be this way.

Registered voters have the technology, from smartphones to library computers, to participate in congressional politics. What we lack, and this year should build, is a platform to connect us with our representatives.

Enough "following" Congress on Facebook and Twitter. Designed for socializing, social-media sites are the wrong forums for political dialogue. A scroll down any congressman's Facebook wall reveals the common pattern of a daily post trailed by "likes" and comments from "friends," with no follow-up from officials.

Last month, as the nation barreled toward the "fiscal cliff," Internet-goers were as likely to encounter tweets about politicians' New Year's plans as they were to find budget commentary. Those who sought insight into the debate via the House Budget Committee's website were redirected to more social sites - to the personal Facebook and Twitter accounts of committee Chairman Paul Ryan.

For all the hype about the Internet improving transparency, 2012 ended on a low note as we passively awaited news of a budget deal to leak out from closed-door meetings.

Now expectations are low, and stories of dissatisfaction with the 113th Congress already saturate the Web. Yet, it's unclear how to reform representation.

The noisiest interest groups capture representatives' attention, but their influence distorts public opinion, reinforces factions and leaves many unheard. We express opinions online, but they're scattered across millions of social-media pages and buried in comments sections below news stories. We want representation, but Congress members cannot be expected to scour cyberspace in search of their constituents.

What if we had a single site to connect us with our representatives? Each morning - the way we check e-mail, Facebook, or the news - we could click an app that informs us of upcoming bills in concise, accessible language. Should a bill pique our interest, we could follow its link to read arguments for and against it. Maybe we lose interest and return to our cereal. But should we care, we would have a direct line to our representatives. We could pre-vote: yes or no. We would pre-vote so that, prior to congressional votes, representatives would receive statistical summaries of their constituents' opinions.

Because we live in a digital representative democracy, elected officials can vote for or against the will of their constituencies, but the app would help hold them accountable. Using the same platform, they could defend their votes, in three to five sentences, to constituents.

We can wait for a pre-voting app to hit the Android market, but we might not want to rely on Google or the next Mark Zuckerberg to change American government. Perhaps we'd like to vote on the future of the Keystone pipeline without accidentally clicking on an ad for mouthwash.

Or maybe even the most libertarian among us will concede that we need our government to accomplish certain things. For centuries, we've depended on the U.S. Postal Service to connect us.

We trust our government to oversee free and fair elections. We rely on our government to maintain the halls of Congress as a representative forum for federal deliberation. Now we need our government to provide an additional forum, one that will convey our opinions to our representatives.

Americans have not yet attempted digital representative democracy. On the contrary, our most vocal advocates for digital democracy - from occupiers to civic hackers - have downplayed traditional representation and instead focused on building a new kind of democracy in which networks of individuals govern themselves.

A pre-voting app aims to accomplish something less radical and more practical. It would reinforce and reimagine the representative form of government we inherited from our Founding Fathers.

We can't rely on digital networking or general assemblies in Zucotti Park to ensure the 113th Congress does a better job than its predecessor. If we don't reconfigure the way Congress represents us, we'll be left hoping in vain for congressmen to keep their promises to "put aside partisan bickering," "reach across the aisle" and "truly serve the people."

For the first time in our nation's history, we have the technology to hold Congress accountable. Our congressmen may change, but it won't be because they promised.

Nat Johnson is a doctoral candidate in history at Stanford University. Send your feedback to us through our online form at sfgate.com/chronicle/submissions/#1.